Thor’s Trials & Tribulations

Thursday, February 2, 2012 by Dick.

!@#$%^ Comcast!

I use the “ecofriendly” auto pay to pay my (basic) cable bill + bundled Internet. I don’t get a paper statement. I don’t mail a check. Then !@#$%^ Comcast grabs whatever they want out of my checking account.

Mistake.

Big mistake.

An hour after I logged into my online cable account, I discovered a line item for $50 for “other services” like PPV or dirty movies. I don’t buy PPV or dirty movies; I can stream them free over the Internoodle.

We had a “service difficulty” around Christmas. Internet was slow, stupid, and balky for a couple of weeks. The !@#$%^ Comcast DNS server kept crashing. Life was lousy in South Puffin.

I called !@#$%^ Comcast and a week or so plus 3 hours later, a technician showed up. Nice guy. Name was Richard. He was pleasant, efficient, and pretty much had nothing to do since the problem was upstream.

!@#$%^&^ COMCAST BILLED ME FOR THE SERVICE CALL.

Good thing I noticed the charge was $50 higher than usual when I logged into my bank account this morning or I never would have known.

It took another hour this morning to load the “customer account page” and then wade through all the auto attends to get a live rep to get a credit. I really really really think they bill for these things and figure at least some percentage of their customers never protest.

Weeee! Free money. The credit will appear on next month’s bill, so they have yet another chance to use my money.

@#$%^ers.

Posted in Business, Dick's Dumps | 3 Comments »

Thor’s Trials & Tribulations

Thursday, January 26, 2012 by Dick.

Google Latitude showed my friend Liz Arden near the Howland and Baker Islands, off Papua New Guinea the other day.

Cool.

Except she was in California, about three blocks from the Googleplex itself at the time.

I tried to enter my own address. Google puts me in Elfrin, FL. Or in Marathon. Or, after I put in the exact street address, city, and Zip three times, down the block at 150 Abblesnaffy Road, South Puffin Beach, FL, 33040. Their map and satellite imagery are right for that location but not for 920 Abblesnaffy Street, South Puffin Beach, FL, 33099.

And when it shows my location, it won’t show Liz Arden’s which strikes me as pretty useless. After all, I know where I am.

Latitudes and attitudes.

Posted in Business, Tech Toys, Dick's Dumps | 4 Comments »

Persembe Peeves

Thursday, January 12, 2012 by Dick.

17,938 Monroe County, Florida, flood insurance policy holders are on the hook for about $896,900 in penalties thanks to FEMA. Policy holders will be charged an extra $50 “added to the premium of every new or renewed flood insurance policy sold within the county for a period of no less than one year from the effective date of probation.” FEMA put Monroe County on probation because a suit claimed that allowing flood insurance in endangered-species habitat violates the Endangered Species Act.

They are adding the surcharge because they can.

The surcharge will go into the black hole of the National Flood Insurance Fund, not to cover higher levels of flood damage, not to mitigate endangered-species habitat violations, but to “offset the extra administrative costs [at] FEMA.”

Posted in Dick's Dumps | 1 Comment »

Thor’s Day Trials & Tribulations

Thursday, January 5, 2012 by Dick.

Ron Paul says, “We should change Congress into a part time institution.”

I’m not sure how he hasn’t noticed. They already are!

Posted in Politics & News, Dick's Dumps | 1 Comment »

Tuesday Twaddle

Tuesday, January 3, 2012 by Dick.

John McCain says, “Every time we get close to a holiday, we get close to a deal.”

Looks like we need lots more Federal holidays.

Posted in Politics & News, Dick's Dumps | 2 Comments »

Thor’s Day Trials & Tribulations

Thursday, December 29, 2011 by Dick.

Pharmacists used to count pills out by hand and dispense them in a bottle with a simple cap until that became unsafe. Then pharmacists counted pills on the counter and dispensed them in a bottle with a “child proof” cap until that became unsafe. Now pharmacists slap a label on a prepackaged carton filled with double-blister wrapped, scalloped indvidual pill nests impervious to shock, awe, nuclear explosion, and fingernails.

Not only have we quadrupled the waste stream, I have to work eight times longer to get the @#$%^ things open.

Posted in ObamaCare, Dick's Dumps | 4 Comments »